The Blue Estuaries Quotes

“Come, drunks and drug-takers; come perverts unnerved!
Receive the laurel, given, though late, on merit; to whom
and wherever deserved.

Parochial punks, trimmers, nice people, joiners true-blue,
Get the hell out of the way of the laurel. It is deathless
And it isn't for you.”
― Louise Bogan, The Blue Estuaries

“Goodbye, goodbye!
There was so much to love, I could not love it all;
I could not love it enough.”
― Louise Bogan, The Blue Estuaries

“At midnight tears
Run into your ears.”
― Louise Bogan, The Blue Estuaries

“In the country whereto I go
I shall not see the face of my friend
Nor her hair the color of sunburnt grasses;
Together we shall not find
The land on whose hills bends the new moon
In air traversed of birds.

What have I thought of love?
I have said, "It is beauty and sorrow."
I have thought that it would bring me lost delights, and splendor
As a wind out of old time . . .

But there is only the evening here,
And the sound of willows
Now and again dipping their long oval leaves in the water.

-- from "Betrothed”
― Louise Bogan, The Blue Estuaries

“You have put your two hands upon me, and your mouth,
You have said my name as a prayer.
Here where trees are planted by water
I have watched your eyes, cleansed from regret,
And your lips, closed over all that love cannot say.”
― Louise Bogan, The Blue Estuaries

“Pasture, stone wall, and steeple,
What most perturbs the mind:
The heart-rending homely people,
Or the horrible beautiful kind?”
― Louise Bogan, The Blue Estuaries

“Slipping in blood, by his own hand, through pride,
Hamlet, Othello, Coriolanus fall.
Upon his bed, however, Shakespeare die,
Having endured them all.”
― Louise Bogan, The Blue Estuaries

“Night"

The cold remote islands
And the blue estuaries
Where what breathes, breathes
The restless wind of the inlets,
And what drinks, drinks
The incoming tide;

Where shell and weed
Wait upon the salt wash of the sea,
And the clear nights of stars
Swing their lights westward
To set behind the land;

Where the pulse clinging to the rocks
Renews itself forever;
Where, again on cloudless nights,
The water reflects
The firmament’s partial setting;

—O remember
In your narrowing dark hours
That more things move
Than blood in the heart.”
― Louise Bogan, The Blue Estuaries

“After The Persian"

1

I have wept with the spring storm;
Burned with the brutal summer.
Now, hearing the wind and the twanging bow-strings
I know what winter brings.

The hunt sweeps out upon the plain
And the garden darkens.
They will bring the trophies home
To bleed and perish
Beside the trellis and the lattices,
Beside the fountain, still flinging diamond water,
Beside the pool
(Which is eight-sided, like my heart).

2

All has been translated into treasure:
Weightless as amber,
Translucent as the currant on the branch,
Dark as the rose's thorn.

Where is the shimmer of evil?
This is the shell's iridescence
And the wild bird's wing.

3

Ignorant, I took up my burden in the wilderness.
Wise with great wisdom, I shall lay it down upon flowers.

4

Goodbye, goodbye!
There was so much to love, I could not love it all;
I could not love it enough.

Some things I overlooked, and some I could not find.
Let the crystal clasp them
When you drink your wine, in autumn.”
― Louise Bogan, The Blue Estuaries

“Song for the Last Act

Now that I have your face by heart, I look

Less at its features than its darkening frame

Where quince and melon, yellow as young flame,

Lie with quilled dahlias and the shepherd's crook.

Beyond, a garden. There, in insolent ease

The lead and marble figures watch the show

Of yet another summer loath to go

Although the scythes hang in the apple trees.


Now that I have your face by heart, I look.


Now that I have your voice by heart, I read

In the black chords upon a dulling page

Music that is not meant for music's cage,

Whose emblems mix with words that shake and bleed.

The staves are shuttled over with a stark

Unprinted silence. In a double dream

I must spell out the storm, the running stream.

The beat's too swift. The notes shift in the dark.


Now that I have your voice by heart, I read.


Now that I have your heart by heart, I see

The wharves with their great ships and architraves;

The rigging and the cargo and the slaves

On a strange beach under a broken sky.

O not departure, but a voyage done!

The bales stand on the stone; the anchor weeps

Its red rust downward, and the long vine creeps

Beside the salt herb, in the lengthening sun.


Now that I have your heart by heart, I see.”
― Louise Bogan, The Blue Estuaries

“Goodbye, goodbye!
There was so much to love, I could not love it all;
I could not love it enough.

— Louise Bogan, from “After the Persian,” The Blue Estuaries: Poems: 1923-1968. (Farrar, Straus and Giroux October 31, 1995) Originally published November 1st 1974.”
― Louise Bogan, The Blue Estuaries